


An (Alternate) Unassuming Valentine's Day

by bwayfan25



Category: ER (TV 1994)
Genre: All in the Family, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Set in the matriarchs universe, Valentine's Day, What would happen if Kerry ended up opposite Sobriki, a canon divergence of a canon divergence, be still my heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:29:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27201139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bwayfan25/pseuds/bwayfan25
Summary: Susan felt her jaw (and fists) clench. But before she had the chance to open her mouth to tell Lucy off in a way not unlike the physician that had apparently already been summoned, she felt the baby move inside her.Just give in. Let them take care of you. You know they mean well and that they only want the best for us.Susan closed her eyes and drew in a long, deep breath through her nose.“Alright, fine,” she conceded with a sigh. “You can put me on the damn monitor.”An AU of the "matriarchs" AU chapter"An Unassuming Valentine's Day"and some of the following chapters where Susan lets Lucy take care of her on the night of Valentine's Day 2000, leaving Kerry to go looking for her in Curtain Three. Starts with an excerpt from the end of said chapter, which then diverges into an alternate take of an alternate universe.
Relationships: Susan Lewis/Kerry Weaver
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	An (Alternate) Unassuming Valentine's Day

“Hey, Dr. Lewis?” 

Susan opened her eyes from where she’d closed them for a brief moment to see Lucy in front of her, looking deeply concerned. 

“What?”

“Could you, uh… Could you come see a patient for me?” she asked hesitantly, her brow furrowing slightly.

Susan heaved a heavy sigh.

“Can’t you have Kovac or Carter do it?”

Lucy stepped forward and dropped her voice. 

“The patient isn’t very comfortable with male doctors,” she told Susan quietly.

Susan considered saying ‘no’ for a long second, but then reluctantly pushed herself back into a standing position and followed Lucy out from behind the desk and past the elevators for the Suture Room. 

“Lucy, there’s no one in here,” Susan said, scanning around the empty room. 

When she glanced up at Lucy in question, she found the med student looking sheepish. 

“I know,” she said hesitantly. “... _You’re_ the patient.”

Immediately, the look of confusion on Susan’s face gave way to anger.

_“Lucy.”_

“I’m _sorry,_ Dr. Lewis,” Lucy moaned, “but you’ve been groaning since you got here and Dave said that you were having lower back pain. I just thought maybe we should put you on a fetal heart monitor just in case-”

“I am not contracting and my water has not broken,” Susan said through gritted teeth. “I am not in labor.”

“I know, but-”

“I came into work tonight to get _away_ from all the smothering, and that’s all you all have been doing since I walked in,” Susan said in frustration. “Why can’t you just trust me when I say I’m not in labor yet? I came here to enjoy my last shift before I go on maternity leave and you all are making it incredibly difficult. I appreciate your concern, but I promise you, when I go into labor, I will _know.”_

Lucy nodded, but the look of sheepishness on her face only seemed to grow. 

Susan let out a huff. 

“What?”

“I _may_ have already called Dr. Weaver...”

Susan felt her jaw (and fists) clench. But before she had the chance to open her mouth to tell Lucy off in a way not unlike the physician that had apparently already been summoned, she felt the baby move inside her. 

Unconsciously, Susan laid her hand on the place where she’d felt the movement. Almost immediately, she felt it again. It was barely more than a flutter - and likely imperceptible to anyone who was not _carrying_ the baby - but it was certainly there. Almost as if the baby understood what was going on and was trying to communicate with her.

_Just give in. Let them take care of you. You know they mean well and that they only want the best for us._

Susan closed her eyes and drew in a long, deep breath through her nose. 

“Alright, fine,” she conceded with a sigh. “You can put me on the damn monitor.”

Lucy stared for a moment, clearly taken aback by the sudden change in Susan’s tone, before she set to work settling the Attending into one of the open beds.

Kerry forced herself to keep herself from flattening the gas pedal as she drove to County. 

On the phone, Lucy had made it sound like Susan was ready to go into labor at any second. It took all of Kerry’s will to not run the red lights in an attempt to get to the hospital before the first contraction. 

(Having two sleepy but excited children in the backseat aided as a law-breaking deterrent.)

Within minutes, Kerry had parked in an accessible spot in the surface lot across the street from the hospital and started rushing the girls out of the car and across the street towards the ER.

“Dr. Weaver, are you on tonight?” the desk clerk Amita said in confusion as the three of them approached the desk.

“No, no. We’re here for Susan. Lucy Knight called to tell me Susan was in the early stages of labor,” Kerry explained, nearly standing on her tiptoes to see behind the desk. “Do you know where she is?”

“Um…” Amita stepped back to glance at the board and then frowned. “I don’t know. She’s not signed up for any patients right now. Maybe in the lounge?”

Kerry nodded and started to turn their little party for the lounge door when she heard Amita ask, “Hey, Dr. Kovac, have you seen Dr. Lewis by chance?” and promptly turned back.

“Uh, last I saw her, she was going to do a leg lac in One,” Luka said as he too glanced at the board. “But I think she was looking for Carmen, who was waiting on Psych to see Lucy’s patient. In, uh… Curtain Three.”

He looked from the board to Kerry. 

“Do you want me to see if she’s still there?”

“No, I’ll go,” she replied, waving him away. “Let me just put them in the lounge.”

“Can’t we go with you to look?” Suzie asked as Kerry started nudging her and Annie towards the lounge door.

“I’ll only be a second,” Kerry said before pushing the door open. “Besides, if Mommy _has_ started having the baby, it’s… Let’s just say it’s kind of a yucky process.”

“Why?” Suzie and Annie asked in unison, their eyes growing wide.

Kerry contemplated how to answer the question for a moment before just shaking her head. 

“You don’t really want to know,” she said (more for her own benefit than for theirs). “Just stay here for a second. I’ll have Carter come get you once I’ve found her, okay?”

The girls both nodded, though they still looked _very_ concerned about the so-called ‘yucky process’ of having a baby. Kerry chuckled slightly before pulling the door to the lounge shut and starting down the hall for Curtain Three.

She hadn’t been this excited to come to the ER in who knows how long, she thought as she all but ran down the hall after a very brief ~~stop~~ pause at the desk to inform them to have Carter fetch the girls once she’d found Susan. But the sight of the lights off in Curtain Three slowed both her and her excitement.

The lights were _never_ supposed to be turned off. Not unless the room was closed off for safety reasons or under renovation, neither of which appeared to be true.

“Do you have any idea who turned the lights off?” Kerry asked a passing Abby Lockhart. 

“Uh, no. No idea,” Abby replied before continuing on. 

“Right. Well, it seems like we might need to have a refresher course on OSHA violations,” Kerry said in what was half-thinking out loud and half a serious declaration. “And the consequences there of.”

She opened the door and stepped inside. 

“Susan?” Kerry questioned into the darkness.

When there was no reply, she turned slightly towards the wall, intent to turn on the light. But as she did so, she noticed the door closing to her right. 

She had only glanced at it out of the corner of her eye at first, thinking it was the door closer preventing it from slamming shut. That was, at least, until she saw the man standing behind it.

He appeared to be in his early to mid-thirties and had dark hair and a matching beard. He had a robe on over his hospital gown, of which Kerry couldn’t make out the exact color or design in the darkness.

They stared at each other in silence for a long moment. But the moment Kerry’s brow started to twitch into a questioning furrow, she saw the smallest gleam of metal in his hand; a small reflection of the hallway light that took the shape of a large butcher knife in the moment that he lunged towards her. 

He moved so quickly and with so much force that Kerry hadn’t the chance to properly process his motion before she felt the tip of the knife pierce her skin _through the cuff of her crutch._

By luck or by God, despite the way the man threw his entire body weight forward towards her, he missed his target and instead managed to embed the knife through almost half an inch of vulcanized rubber.

Kerry instinctively pulled her arm closer towards her, which made the knife dislodge and clatter to the floor. But as this meant shifting her weight from her well-supported right side to her ill-supported left side, her hip twinged in indignation, causing her to stumble as she tried to keep it from buckling beneath her.

As she struggled to find her footing, the man looked around furiously for his fallen weapon. His movements were just as quick as his earlier lunge, but lower to the ground. 

It was in his crouching that Kerry saw her opportunity. Though her doctor brain told her that head and neck injuries like the one she was about to cause could result in permanent damage and disability (or worse), the rest of her brain and body currently fueled by adrenaline disregarded that sound medical advice and instead told her to prepare her strike. 

But the adrenaline was pounding _too_ hard. Her hands were shaking so much that she couldn’t get ahold of her crutch in a way fit to bludgeon him properly before the glint of metal drew her attention. 

He’d managed to get the knife again and had spun to face her. His left hand was aloft as he prepared to lunge once more. 

This time, Kerry stepped away from him preemptively. She resumed her normal grip on her crutch and then stepped back, not daring to tear her eyes away from him for even a millisecond. But something slick on the floor prevented the rubber from getting traction on the tile. 

Against her best judgment, Kerry looked down for the briefest of seconds to see a pool of dark liquid on the floor beneath her.

She didn’t question what it was, but rather who it had come from. For, though she wasn’t sure of much at the moment, she was quite certain that it didn't belong to her. (Yet.)

Her thoughts couldn’t linger on it for long, though, as the man seized his opportunity in her momentary glance and lunged again. 

Despite sensing the outcome, Kerry forced herself to step back and away from the oncoming attack. And, sure enough, neither her crutch nor her shoes could grip the floor enough in the pool of blood beneath her to keep her upright. 

Though she consciously knew how to fall properly in order to avoid injury, in the moment, Kerry’s survival instincts took over and left all propriety behind. Her right arm flew out behind her in a last-ditch effort to break her fall and then proceeded to do just that, resulting in a sickening _crunch_ as it entangled with her crutch upon impact. 

She turned out to be closer to the wall than she’d anticipated, which she learned the moment her head connected back against it. Immediately, her eyes began to water. She couldn’t be sure if it was this or the growing pain on the back of her head that then caused her vision to blur, but she didn’t care much at that moment.

Given that his target had moved, the man’s hand swung down through the air with great force, but connected with nothing. He seemed to pay it little mind though, and immediately lunged again underhanded. 

The knife would have gone straight into Kerry’s shoulder if the man had taken the pool of blood Kerry had just slipped in into account. 

Instead, he slipped too, causing the knife to yet again miss its mark. Instead of embedding itself deeply into Kerry’s shoulder, it instead plunged into the outside of Kerry’s left thigh as he fell face first onto the tile next to her. 

She let out a gasp of pain, both at the piercing of the knife into her flesh and at the way his fall threatened to pull her hip out of socket. 

While part of his body had landed on her, his face landed on the tile, breaking his nose. He was so dazed by the impact and resulting blood loss that he didn’t notice Kerry roll him off of her so she could attempt to reduce her subluxated hip.

In an effort to calm her rising panic (and dizziness and impending unconsciousness due to shock), Kerry tried to assess the location of the knife in comparison to major veins and arteries. 

It was too lateral to have hit the bone. And while it had felt like it had gone in all the way up to the handle in the moment, in reality the blade appeared to only have gone in about ⅓ of its length, or about 2.5 cm. If she estimated her sweatpants were at least a few millimeters thick and there was about 3.5 to 4 cm between her skin and her femoral artery, it had done damage to her quadriceps muscle, but she’d live.

Once sure she was not in imminent danger of bleeding out, Kerry let out a long grown and let her head loll to the side. She blinked a few times to rid the fuzziness growing at the edges of her vision, only to suddenly understand to whom the pool of blood belonged. 

“Carmen?” Kerry said weakly. _“Carmen?”_

Carmen lay on the floor on the opposite side of the bed. Though she was covered in blood and lay very still, her eye twitched at the sound of her name. 

Before Kerry could say or do anything else, the man scrambled to his feet. He yanked the knife out as he rose, causing her to shout in anguish (and in the knowledge that removing embedded objects from the human body was supposed to be left to trained surgeons). But that didn’t matter as the light from the hallway seemed to disappear above her. 

She looked up to see the shadow of the man standing over her, knife in hand as he readied himself for one last strike. 

Tears welled in Kerry’s eyes once more, but this time, it was not due to slamming her head against the wall. As her perception of the world slowed, she felt the fear of mortality rise inside her.

This was it, she thought as sobs grew in her chest. She was going to die here on the floor of an ER exam room, a victim of the same stab wounds she treated every day. 

She’d never get to see her daughters grow up. She’d never get to grow old with Susan. She’d never even get to meet their new baby, the final addition to their family that would always be uniquely their own.

She was too _young_ . She had too much left here on earth. Too much to do. Too much to see. She was happy and loved and lov _ing_ in a way she once only dreamed of. She had a family - a _big_ one - that was counting on her and waiting for her to come back.

And, as if her own mind was intent on making matters worse, she had a fleeting thought that was surely meant to be reassuring but, in the moment, only felt like the final nail in her soon-to-be coffin.

_At least I’ll get to see my parents again._

Kerry knew why she thought it. She _knew_ why it popped into her head. She’d ached to see them again, to be with them again, since the very days they died. The promise of reunifying with them again in the afterlife was often the only shred of any faith she felt she had left. 

But as much as she missed them, as much as she longed to be held by them again, it wasn’t time. It wasn’t supposed to happen _yet._

 _Kerry, promise me,_ she heard her mother’s voice say in her head as the man lifted the knife above her. _Promise me you’re going to take care of your girls._

 _I promise,_ she heard her own voice reply. _I promise._

She’d broken her promise. 

She’d failed. 

The one thing Mildred had made her promise to do, her mother’s one dying wish... and she had failed. 

She wasn’t with Susan. She wasn’t with the girls. She was trapped here about to die and fail her mother in the most permanent sense possible. 

After all, she couldn’t take care of them if she was dead. 

The man began to swing the knife down towards her. She could see the silhouette of the knife coming closer to her, a physical representation of her imminent demise.

Kerry felt something squeeze her arm. 

She glanced down, expecting to see Carmen’s hand reaching out to her as they neared their ends together… but there was nothing there.

Nothing but the very real feeling of someone squeezing her arm. Almost as if they were standing above her, trying to pull her up into a standing position.

Now, Kerry Weaver was a rational woman. One who did her best to keep herself as grounded as she possibly could, to the point where she sometimes approached things _so_ rationally that she came off as cold and detached. And though she’d chalk it up to many things over the years - exhaustion, emotional distress, an overactive imagination - deep down, she could never find a reason good enough to explain why, at that very moment, she heard her mother’s voice so clearly it was almost as if she was standing there talking to her.

_Kerry, my love, you could never fail me. But I would be very disappointed in you if you took this without a fight._

A new rush of adrenaline surged through her.

She was not going to fail. Not this. Not _ever._

Hissing as she gingerly pulled her arm from (what now only vaguely resembled) the cuff of her crutch, she gripped the shaft with both hands as best she could and made one final swing. 

It was an awkward angle to swing from, but it proved an effective one. In the moment before she had to let go as her right wrist screamed in pain, Kerry managed to connect the mangled rubber of the cuff to the side of the man’s jaw, knocking him out cold. 

She watched as his body went limp and he fell forward. His head too cracked against the wall as he fell, leaving a trail of blood as he crumpled into a pile on top of her once more.

While his body certainly supplied adequate pressure to the wound, it once more pulled at her hip joint. This time, it did more than just partially dislocate. Even sitting down, she could feel her femur and pelvis out of place. 

But he was too heavy for her to budge from where the angle she was pinned, even without additional injuries preventing her from pushing at him. Trying to pull herself out from under him was no use either, as it just pulled the ball of her femur further out of the socket.

It was almost funny in a way, she thought as she gingerly leaned her head back against the wall. She’d spent so many years fearing the worst thing that could happen to her in the ER was her hip somehow rendering her unable to do what she needed to do. But right now, in the moment that it actually happened, it now ranked nowhere _near_ the worst thing that could possibly happen (or had).

Unable to move nor summon the energy to call for help, Kerry looked back at Carmen. 

From where she sat she could _just_ reach Carmen’s wrist with her outstretched hand. And even though the action drew enough pain to bring the encroaching black of unconsciousness into the edge of her vision, Kerry felt the slightest glimmer of hope at the beat of Carmen’s pulse under her fingers.

Suzie hopped Pip Pop the bunny up one of Annie’s crutches and then up her arm. Annie barely noticed as she was too busy braiding the strands of hair that kept falling in front of her eyes. But after letting go of the braid only caused more hair to fall in her face, Annie let out a huff.

“Where is _Carter?”_

“Maybe Momma forgot to tell him to come get us,” Suzie suggested as she hopped Pip Pop off of Annie’s shoulder and onto her knee.

Annie considered this for a moment before standing up, causing Pip Pop to fall out of Suzie’s hand and onto the floor (which in turn caused Suzie to pick the bunny up and hit her on the leg with it).

“We should go ask where he is,” Annie said as she started for the door.

“Momma told us to stay here.”

“Well, Momma hasn’t come back either,” Annie replied, unfazed from her mission. “We should go ask the desk.”

“You’re gonna get us in trouble,” Suzie said, her little brow furrowing in frustration.

“I would get us in trouble if I left you here by yourself,” Annie shot back. “Now, come _on.”_

Though still resolutely pouting, Suzie grabbed hold of the bottom of Annie’s coat and followed her to the desk. 

Annie had to stand on the very tips of her toes to even peek over the desk, but, luckily for her, Amita saw her red hair and peered over the top to look at her.

“Can I help you girls?” she asked, grinning broadly.

“Have you seen Carter?” Annie asked, straining her neck to see behind the desk clerk (not unlike her mother was doing only a little while earlier). 

“Or our moms?” Suzie added, poking her head out from behind her sister. 

“I saw Dr. Weaver come by earlier, but I haven’t seen her since,” Amita explained. “And, I haven’t seen… Oh, wait. Perfect timing. Dr. Carter?”

Carter looked up from the chart in his hand as he stepped out from behind the desk and noticed the two girls standing in front of him. His face broke into a wide grin at the sight of them.

“Hey! What are you guys doing here?”

“Have you seen Momma?” Annie asked, frowning. “She said she was going to have you come get us when she found Mommy, but you never came and she hasn’t come back either.”

“She probably just forgot to tell me,” Carter replied with a shrug. 

“See? I _told_ you, Annie,” Suzie said before hitting Annie again with her stuffed bunny. 

“I never said you were _wrong,_ Suzie,” Annie said with a sneer.

“Hey, hey,” Carter said as he instinctively stepped in between them. “I know where Mommy is. I’ll take you to her. Come on.”

He nodded them to follow him (after a brief pause to ensure no further hitting and/or sneering). 

Carter led the two girls down the front hallway past the elevators and the door to Curtain Three. When they reached the Trauma Rooms, he led them down the hallway to their right and then to the Suture Room.

Both girls lit up upon seeing Susan (who also visibly relaxed the moment she spotted them) before their faces grew solemn with concern.

“I know this looks weird,” Susan said, motioning to the fetal heart monitor wrapped around her stomach that she thought was causing their concern. “But I promise that this is just so we can listen to the baby’s heartbeat.”

When this didn’t seem to assuage their worry, Susan’s brow furrowed. 

“What’s wrong?” she asked, the same concern creeping into her tone. “Girls?”

Annie didn’t reply for a moment as she was too busy carefully scanning the room for any sign of Kerry. Suzie did the same for a second before looking to Annie for an answer. 

“Where’s Momma?”

Susan’s worried expression deepened. 

“She’s not with you?”

“No,” Annie replied, shaking her head. “She was gonna have Carter come get us but he never did so we went to get him. And he said he thought Momma forgot to tell him she found you, so he brought us to you. But you’re here and she’s not.”

Susan looked from the girls to Carter,

“She hasn’t come by at all?” Carter asked, glancing between Lucy and Susan.

But the look in Susan’s eye told him that he already knew the answer.

The moment of silence that fell as Susan, Lucy, and Carter communicated their growing confusion and concern through looks alone. But the longer the grownups failed to say anything, the more anxious the girls got. 

Susan managed to sense this only seconds before the girls burst into worried tears. 

“Maybe she went upstairs,” Susan said quickly as she looked from Carter down to the girls. “Maybe she thought that I’d gone upstairs to have the baby and she just hasn’t come back down yet.”

Susan had the sneaking feeling that the girls could see through her gambit, but before she could say anything else to mitigate their anxiety, she contracted. _Hard._

“Mommy, are you okay?” Suzie asked as Susan doubled over where she sat.

“...Yeah,” Susan said, grimacing as she nodded. “I think… I think the baby heard us and… and decided it’s ready to come out.”

She exhaled deeply as the contraction subsided and then looked back up at Carter. 

“Why don’t you…” Susan let out a deep breath. “Why don’t we go upstairs?”

Lucy nodded quickly and made for the phone to call up to L&D. Carter nodded too, before the sound of someone running down the hallway pulled his attention away.

He stepped out into the hall just in time to step _back_ before Luka Kovac bowled him over. 

“What’s wrong-” Carter began before Kovac cut him off.

“Where are Dr. Weaver’s children?” Kovac asked seriously, looking Carter straight in the eye.

“They’re in there. With Susan,” Carter answered, jerking a thumb towards the Suture Room.

“Good, good,” Kovac said with a sigh of relief.

“Why? What happened?” Carter asked, frowning.

“Carmen’s patient. _Your_ patient,” Kovac said, pointing at Lucy as she joined them in the hallway.

“What about him?” Lucy asked, glancing between the two men. 

“Apparently, he got a knife out of the lounge,” Kovac explained. 

“A… A _knife_?” Lucy’s eyes widened. “But… But I left Carmen in there with him-”

“Yes, we know,” Kovac replied darkly. “We found her. And Kerry too. That’s why I came looking for the girls.”

Before Kovac could say anything else, there was a rumbling down the hall accompanied by the sound of shouting. And as they watched, they saw not one but _two_ gurneys moving out of Curtain Three and into the Trauma Rooms. 

And at least one of the patients had bright red hair.

She felt the heaviness before anything else. 

It was almost as if the entirety of the earth’s gravity was pulling on every inch of her body, making it almost impossible even to just open her eyes.

As her consciousness slowly returned, she took mental stock of the heaviness. Each new thought, each new body part she considered, seemed to grow lighter as she released it until she could finally open her eyes. 

She was sitting in a hospital bed. Her head was reclined back against a pillow, offering soft support to the throbbing on the back of her head. 

As she lifted her head, she found it had not been released of the heaviness like the rest of her body had, as doing so nearly made her swoon.

She laid her head back down and closed her eyes against the rising nausea for a long moment. Then, once sure that she was not going to vomit, she tried lifting it once more (albeit far slower than she had the first time).

The nausea didn’t return, allowing her to blink herself awake and look around again. 

“Mark?” Kerry asked at the sight of the man in the chair next to the bed.

Mark smiled slightly and lifted his hand in a small wave. 

“Hey. You’re finally awake,” he said quietly. “How do you feel?”

For a second, Mark thought she hadn’t heard him as she did not respond but rather just looked around. But before he could repeat himself, he saw the alarm growing on her face.

“Where are the girls?” she asked as she looked around, ignoring her returning nausea in favor of her returning panic. “Where’s Susan?”

“They’re okay. They’re safe,” Mark assured her gently. “The girls are with Carter, and Susan’s down the hall having the baby.”

“Susan’s having the baby?” Kerry asked, sitting up straighter, her eyes growing wide. “Is she…. Is she alone? Is someone with her?”

“No, she’s not alone. Elizabeth is with her,” Mark informed her in the same gentle tone. “She was paged in to help take care of stitching up your leg, but apparently a couple of the residents were already taking care of it. And since Peter and Romano were already working on Carmen, she went in to help Susan.”

Mark was sure Kerry would say something about residents being permitted to perform surgery on her in place of an Attending, but she didn’t. She just remained stiff for a moment before relaxing back against the pillow. From where he sat, Mark could hear her forcing herself to breathe deeply.

“Carmen,” he heard her say quietly before she stiffened again and her expression changed back into deep panic. “Carmen was on the floor. The blood… She was bleeding-”

Kerry’s head snapped up in Mark’s direction. The look on her face was one of abject terror.

“The man- The man with the knife,” she said in a voice barely more than a squeak. “The patient… He was- was behind the door… He was-”

“Kerry- Kerry, breathe. Take a deep breath,” Mark instructed in what he hoped was a calming. “Psych’s got him. They’re looking after him. You’re okay. You’re safe.”

Kerry looked at him for a long moment.

He naturally expected her to snap back into her normal self or snap at _him,_ telling him she knew that and why would he ever think she didn’t and that she appreciated his assurances, but she really didn’t need them. 

But she didn’t. 

She just sat there in silence for a long moment, staring at the wall, her face alight with anxiety. 

“I’m safe,” she repeated in a voice barely more than a whisper. “And-and-and the girls are with Carter. And Susan’s… Susan’s with Elizabeth.”

Mark nodded, though Kerry didn’t notice. She was still staring at the wall, processing everything that had taken place.

Though he wouldn’t admit this outloud, seeing Kerry in such a state scared Mark in a way he wasn’t expecting. 

He’d seen her nervous about things before, sure, but this was different. Those times (save for one specific day best referred to as ‘the day Rachel and Annie met’) always involved frustration. Her (admittedly already short) fuse got a bit shorter and tellings off were more common. But to see her like she was now, in pure abject terror, was something entirely new. 

Mark watched her continued contemplation for another long moment. When her gaze finally broke from where it had been locked on the wall, it fell on her right hand. 

“Non-displaced Colles fracture,” Mark informed her as she examined the fiberglass cast encasing her arm from the palm of her hand up to just below her elbow. “They said they found you on the floor, so I’d guess it was from a fall.”

Kerry nodded slightly as she turned her hand over and back several times to examine it. All the while, she bent and flexed her fingers, making sure the application of the cast had not cut off any circulation.

“The knife penetrated your rectus femoris, so they had to stitch up the muscle some before they could stitch up the wound,” he continued as Kerry set her arm back down. “And you’ve also got a minor concussion and they mentioned something about having to reduce your left hip.”

Kerry naturally tuned any pain in her hip out as best she could, so as not to get distracted by it. So, when she focused on it and felt _no_ pain whatsoever - even following a full dislocation - she realized that the IV taped to the back of her left hand was probably delivering more than just intravenous antibiotics. 

That being said, even with the pain temporarily numbed by the lingering anesthesia, she could still feel the knee immobilizer around her left leg meant to prevent knee flexion while the quad muscle healed.

“They want to keep you overnight,” Mark informed her, his tone taking on an air of finality. “I can’t say if that’s because of the injuries or because they’re going to keep Susan and figure they should just keep you too. Either way, they brought you up here so you can have the room together. They’ll bring Susan in as soon as she’s done.”

At the sound of Susan’s name, Kerry looked up. 

She looked from Mark to the open door and then back to him. 

“I’m supposed to be there with her,” Kerry said, the earlier panic creeping back into her voice. “How far along is she? Is there still time?”

She made almost as if she was going to try and throw the blanket off of her legs and rush from the room, which drew Mark up out of his chair again. He raised a hand to slow her down.

“Kerry, you’re not going anywhere,” he explained in a firm but still gentle voice. “You need to stay here.”

“But… But…” Tears began to well in her eyes again. “She’s my wife, Mark. I’m… I should be in there with her.”

“I understand,” Mark replied, nodding. “But I think right now, your wife would want you to stay here and rest.”

Perhaps Kerry respected that Mark was the only person other than herself that could speak to Susan’s wishes, or perhaps she was just too exhausted to argue, but either way, she just nodded. 

Her panic subsided, her expression changed from anxiety to melancholy. And while some part of Mark wondered if she was doing it intentionally in an effort to still get her way, the sorrow in her eyes and the candor of her emotions since she’d woken up quashed the notion quickly.

“Do you want me to bring the girls in?” he offered after a moment. “If you’re ready, that is.”

Kerry looked back up at him and then gave another small nod. 

“Yes please.”

Mark nodded and rose from his chair. He disappeared out the door and down the hall for a couple minutes before returning with Annie and Suzie in tow. 

“Momma!” Suzie exclaimed in relief upon seeing Kerry. 

Immediately, she ran around to the left side of the bed and clambered up into it. But as she went to curl herself in Kerry’s side, Kerry let out an involuntary hiss of pain.

“What’s wrong?” Suzie asked, her expression growing worried. “Did that hurt?”

“I’m just… I’m just sore,” Kerry said as she exhaled. 

Suzie paused, wondering if she should get down so as not to hurt Momma anymore, when Kerry wrapped her arm around her and pulled her in close. 

“Did you break your arm?” Suzie asked, pointing to the cast.

“No, but I guess I broke my wrist. When I fell earlier, I tried to catch myself,” Kerry replied, picking her hand up to show Suzie better. “In the ER, we have a word for that. You know what it is?”

“What?”

“A foosh.”

“A foosh?”

“Yep. A foosh,” Kerry said, nodding. “It stands for ‘fall onto outstretched hand.’”

Suzie rubbed a finger over the texture of the fiberglass and then poked at it a couple times, as if testing how hard it was.

“This is your crutch hand,” she commented, looking up at Kerry. “How are you gonna be able to walk?”

“That is a very good question,” Kerry replied with a sigh. “I don’t know.”

Suzie poked at it again and then cocked her head in question.

“Why is it white?”

“What do you mean ‘why is it white?’” Kerry asked, frowning. 

“Aren’t they usually other colors?” 

Kerry considered the question and then gave a small shrug (which made her hiss again as the action pulled at her bruised skin). 

“I guess they usually are. But I think they made mine white because they didn’t know what color I’d want.” Kerry looked down at Suzie. “What color do you think it should be?

Suzie thought hard for a moment before answering, “Green.”

Kerry chuckled and pulled the young girl closer to her. She kissed her on the top of her head and then looked up at her other daughter, who was standing a few feet away from the bed. 

“What color do you think it should be, Annie?” Kerry asked before her weak smile faded into a concerned frown. “Annie? Annie, honey?”

Annie stood stock still, staring at Kerry in the bed. Her brow was deeply furrowed and she looked close to tears. 

“They said that there-there was a guy with a knife who was trying to hurt you,” Annie said in a tiny voice. “They-they-they said that he was… that he stabbed you.”

The fear in Annie’s voice almost made Kerry choke up again, but instead, she just raised her hand towards her eldest daughter. 

“He did. He got me in the leg, but it’s okay. The doctors fixed it up. He didn’t hit anything important,” Kerry assured her. “I’m okay, honey. I promise. Come here.”

Annie didn’t have to be asked twice. She just pulled her arms out of her crutches and climbed up onto Kerry’s right side. The moment she buried her face into Kerry’s chest, she began to sob.

Kerry just pulled her as close as she comfortably could and murmured soft words of comfort to her.

“So, he…” Annie said in between breaths. “So-so, he didn’t… he didn’t cut you b-bad?”

“No, he didn’t cut me bad. It’s gonna hurt for a while, but it’s going to be okay,” Kerry said gently. “The first time he tried to cut me, he ended up hitting the cuff of my crutch.”

“He stabbed your _crutch?”_ Annie said in disbelief.

At the look of her nine-and-a-half-year-old daughter looking so utterly floored by the very thought of this, Kerry couldn’t help but chuckle.

“Well, when you say it like that, it sounds kind of funny,” Kerry said with another weak smile. “But I got him back for it. I hit him with it and knocked him out.”

Annie frowned. 

“Wait. I thought we weren’t allowed to hit people with our crutches?”

“Annie, if someone is trying to hurt you, you have permission to hit them as hard and as much as you possibly can until you can get away from them,” Kerry told her seriously. “And the same goes for you, Suzie. You hit, you kick, you bite, you scream - whatever you need to do to get somewhere safe, okay?”

Suzie nodded, but Annie appeared to still be thinking through this. 

“So, I can hit people if they’re trying to hurt me?”

“Yes. You can absolutely hit people if they’re trying to hurt you.”

Annie nodded and then lit up. 

“So, does that mean-”

“Suzie doesn’t count,” Kerry answered before Annie could even finish the sentence. 

And, proving she was right, Annie immediately deflated with a disappointed groan. 

Suzie blew a raspberry at her older sister before tucking herself back into Kerry’s side before Annie could retaliate.

As they settled, Kerry laid her head back against the pillow. In doing so, she saw Mark hanging close to the door. When they had made eye contact, Kerry mouthed, _“Thank you.”_

Mark nodded and then retook his seat in the chair. 

Kerry closed her eyes and refocused her still-fearful thoughts on the girls. 

They were right here with her. She could feel them next to her. She could hear their breathing. And, if she opened her eyes, she would see them right there in front of her.

They were safe. She was safe. Susan was safe. 

Kerry repeated the words in her head over and over again as her brain and body relaxed. She was very close to falling asleep when she felt the girls sit up.

“Mommy!”

Kerry opened her eyes just in time to see both girls climb down from the bed and rush towards Susan, who had been wheeled into the room by Elizabeth. 

“Hi, girls,” she greeted them tiredly as they both hugged her at once. 

“Where’s the baby?” Suzie asked as she straightened up.

“You _did_ have it, right?” Annie added as she too noticed the lack of a bundle of blankets in Susan’s arms. 

“Yes, I had it,” Susan said with a small chuckle. “The nurses have her right now. They’re going to clean all the schmutz off of her and run the tests they do for new babies.”

“Her?” Suzie perked up. “The baby’s a girl?”

“Yep. It’s a girl,” Susan said with a smile. “You’ve got a new baby sister.”

Suzie and Annie exchanged excited (and triumphant) glances.

“And I was thinking,” Susan continued, looking between them, “that, while we wait for them to bring her in, you and Uncle Mark go downstairs to the cafeteria and get a bunch of snacks for us. Chips, cookies - whatever you want. That way we can properly celebrate when you come back.”

Annie and Suzie nodded enthusiastically. 

Mark stepped into the hall to wait while the girls picked up Annie’s crutches from where she’d dropped them earlier. But as they joined Mark in the hall, Suzie stopped and turned back. 

“Wait, a second,” she said before running back around the bed and tucking Pip Pop into the crook of Kerry’s left arm. “Here, Momma. I want you to hold him.”

“Okay,” Kerry replied, nodding. “I’ll keep him safe while you’re gone.”

“No,” Suzie said, her blonde braid bouncing as she shook her head. “This time, he’s gonna keep _you_ safe while I’m gone.”

And with that, she joined Mark and Annie in the hall so they could set off on their mission for snacks.

Once they were gone, Elizabeth pushed Susan forward and then held onto her as she carefully stood up and turned to sit on the bed. Then, Elizabeth moved the wheelchair out of the way and started for the door. 

“I’m going to go see if Robert and Peter need any help,” she explained at the look of question on their faces. “I’ll be back in a little while.”

At Susan and Kerry’s responding nods, Elizabeth smiled and then stepped out into the hall. Once she’d pulled the door shut behind her, the two women on the bed looked at each other. 

Susan’s tears, which had started the moment she saw Kerry lying in the bed but had been interrupted by the girls’ excitement, returned en force as she gently cupped Kerry’s cheek with her hand.

“Hi,” she said softly as the tears of fear and relief began to roll down her cheeks. 

“Hi,” Kerry replied weakly, relaxing at Susan’s touch. 

“I would scoot closer and kiss you,” Susan said with a small smile, “but I can’t feel the lower half of my body. Not to mention I’m also wearing what’s essentially a diaper, since I just pushed an entire human being out of me.”

Kerry smiled weakly before her brow furrowed. 

“Do you want help to stand up?” she asked in concern. “I can-”

“No, you can’t,” Susan said, cutting her off with a raised hand. “Not right now.”

“Susan, I’m fine,” Kerry tried to assure her. “Really. I’m fine.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, Kerry, but you’ve never looked _less_ fine.”

And, as if to emphasize her point, Susan nodded towards the cast on Kerry’s wrist and bruises that had bloomed over her arms. (She’d have nodded at the dark circles under Kerry’s eyes too had Kerry been able to see them at that moment.)

“Susan, I’m okay. I promise,” Kerry tried to assure her again. “It’s… It’s nothing-”

“I was under the impression that you just woke up from surgery,” Susan said, raising an eyebrow. 

Kerry’s mouth worked wordlessly for a moment before she sighed. 

“They had to do a small surgical repair on my quad,” she conceded. “But that’s fairly minor. And, yes, I’ve got a broken wrist and a concussion and-”

 _“And?”_ Susan said, her brow rising in concern. “There’s _more?”_

Kerry gave a small shrug, grimacing at the soreness in her shoulders. 

“Apparently I dislocated my hip,” Kerry said, before quickly adding, “But it does that sometimes. That’s nothing new.”

The concern in Susan’s expression, though still very present, was overtaken with the beginnings of frustration.

“We don’t need to worry about me,” Kerry finished in as firm a voice as she could muster. “We should be worrying about _you._ You’re the one who just had a baby.”

At the sincerity in Kerry’s eyes, Susan’s expression softened once again. She brushed her thumb over Kerry’s cheek once more. 

“I don’t think it would be the end of the world to worry about both of us,” she said quietly. “Besides, everything went very routine on my end. And _fast._ She decided she was ready and she was _ready._ Felt like I went from 2 cm to 10 cm in an hour. It was lucky I was already here, because they said if I’d gotten upstairs any later, they might not have been able to give me the epidural.”

Kerry nodded, but as she listened to Susan describe the delivery, she felt guilty sobs rise in her chest. 

“Susan, I’m so sorry,” she said as her own tears began to roll down her cheeks. 

“Sorry?” Susan asked, her brow furrowing with worry. “What do you have to be sorry for?”

“I shouldn’t have come looking for you. I should have just stayed at the desk,” Kerry said breathily amidst her tears. “I should have been in there with you.”

Susan felt emotion tighten her own chest. Careful not to do anything that might hurt her or Kerry, Susan lifted herself off the bed and moved closer to Kerry so she could pull her wife into her arms. 

It ended up being more of a pull _towards_ instead of a pull _into,_ but regardless, Susan wrapped her arms around Kerry as much as she possibly could and just held onto her as her sobs dampened the shoulder of her hospital gown. 

When Kerry finally lifted her head, Susan kissed her deeply on the lips and then touched her forehead against Kerry’s. 

“You’re here with me now. And that’s what matters,” she said in a voice shaky with her own tears. “All I could think of was while I was in there was whether or not you were okay, because I don’t… I don’t know-”

Susan cut herself off as the thought was too much to bear. She took a deep breath. 

“I have never been more grateful for a broken wrist and a surgically-repaired quad muscle and a dislocated hip, if only because I… I know how much worse it could have been,” Susan said as sincerely as she could. “Please don’t go blaming yourself for this. If anything, blame me. I’m the one who insisted on coming to work tonight. You’d have never had to go looking for me if I’d just stayed home like you asked.”

Susan could tell she’d gotten through given the way Kerry sucked in air as if preparing to retort. But she didn’t and instead just took a few more deep breaths before sitting up.

They both took a moment to wipe at their eyes before Susan took Kerry’s right hand in her own to observe it better. 

“Colles cast?” Susan asked as she observed the short arm cast.

“For a Colles fracture. Mark says it was non-displaced, so I assume it’s just the radius and nothing else,” Kerry replied, referring to the distal radial fracture named by Abraham Colles. “Probably from falling.”

“You fooshed,” Susan concluded.

“I fooshed.” Kerry shook her head in disappointment. “I know better than to try and catch myself like that, but there was… there was blood on the floor.”

At the way Kerry’s words slowed at the mention of the blood, Susan glanced up to find her staring at the blanket. 

“There was… It was Carmen’s blood,” Kerry continued in the same slower tone. “It was on the floor and I-I-I slipped…”

Kerry continued to stare at the blanket for a moment before blinking several times and looking back up at Susan. At Susan’s look of concern, Kerry looked back down at the cast. 

“Suzie asked me why it was white. I guess she’s used to seeing them in other colors,” Kerry explained as if she hadn’t just gotten momentarily lost in the evening’s earlier events. “I asked her what color she thought it should be and she said green.”

“A girl after Annie’s own heart,” Susan said, smiling. “Well, she’s got a point. I’m not going to let you get discharged with a plain white cast. You have to choose at least _one_ color.”

“Susan, I’m not going to get a colored cast,” Kerry scoffed, rolling her eyes. “I’m thirty-eight years old. And a professional-”

“What and I’m _not?”_ Susan challenged. 

At the memory of Susan’s insistence (and receipt) of a pink and yellow striped cast after breaking her foot a few years back, Kerry shook her head. 

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Uh-huh,” Susan replied, playfully narrowing her eyes. “Just for that, I’m going to tell them to make it yellow.”

Susan took pleasure in Kerry’s chuckle and eyeroll. Then, she blinked. 

“It just occurred to me - this is on your right hand,” she said pointing at the cast. “How are you going to-”

“I have no idea,” Kerry said with a sigh. “And, frankly, I don’t really care right now.”

Susan nodded absently, though she was clearly still thinking about the issue. 

“Well, your wrist is straight when you use it,” she thought out loud. “But I guess you can’t really close your hand all the way. And, of course, there’s the whole ‘weight-bearing’ thing.”

Susan looked up at Kerry.

“You might have to use a cane for the next six weeks. Granted you’re allowed to walk at all.”

Kerry reclined her head back against the pillow. 

“I think I need to re-submit my FMLA to take medical leave for the next six weeks.”

Susan considered this for a moment and then shrugged in acknowledgement.

“It might actually have a better chance of being approved that way,” Susan remarked. “Give you a better chance of being home with us.”

Before Kerry could respond, the door to the room opened as a nurse in pink and purple scrubs pushed in a clear bassinet. 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the nurse apologized as she sensed she’d interrupted something. “I should have knocked-”

But Kerry and Susan just shook their heads and waved her away (well, waved her _in)_. The nurse pushed the bassinet up to the edge of the bed. 

Kerry felt herself tearing up again at the sight of the newborn inside it, wrapped in a blanket with a little pink and blue hat on when she felt Susan touch her arm gently. She glanced up.

“Ready to meet your new daughter?” Susan asked with a smile.

The tears began to roll again as Kerry nodded. 

Susan requested a few extra pillows, which she then helped arrange under Kerry’s arms. But when the nurse checked the baby’s hospital bracelet against Kerry’s, she frowned.

“Hang on. I think I’m in the wrong room,” she said, frowning. “This is Baby Girl Lewis, not Baby Girl Weaver.”

“No, that’s right,” Susan said, holding up her own hospital bracelet for the nurse to check. “I gave birth to her, but we’re both her moms.”

The nurse confirmed that Susan’s last name matched the one of the baby in the bassinet and then nodded. Then, she lifted the newborn up and settled her into Kerry’s arms before leaving the new (but not really new) moms alone.

“Oh, Susan,” Kerry said breathlessly as she looked down at the baby in her arms. “She’s beautiful.”

Kerry brushed a gentle finger over the baby’s cheek. 

“I know we talked about naming the baby after your mom if it was a girl,” Susan said as she watched Kerry gaze lovingly at the newborn. “But she doesn’t really strike me as a Mildred.”

Kerry tilted her head to look at the baby from another angle. 

In all honesty, the baby in her arms looked like a _Susan_ , but that was merely in resemblance. (Besides, they already had one daughter with that name already).

“And when you think about it, any name we give her would have to fit the theme of the other ones,” Susan mused. “You know, derivative nickname and trouble name?”

“We could call her Millie,” Kerry suggested. “And Mildred could just be her trouble name.”

“True,” Susan replied with a shrug of acknowledgement. “But we’d be naming her after your mother and I personally don’t feel like anyone could have called _her_ Millie. And, you know, gotten away with it.”

“My dad got away with it,” Kerry said, almost defensively. Then, she let out a sigh of concession. _“Sometimes.”_

Susan chuckled. 

“Well, we were going to do Henry for a boy. What if we did Henri with an i? Short for Henrietta?” Kerry thought out loud.

“We are _not_ naming our newborn daughter Henrietta,” Susan stated adamantly. “If we’re going to give her a traditionally masculine name, I’d rather call her Charlie.”

Kerry glanced up from looking at the baby and raised an eyebrow. 

“Charlotte?”

Susan’s mouth broke into a soft smile. 

“Charlotte Mildred.”

Kerry felt a sob rise in her chest at the suggestion, which for some reason, felt like a seal of her mother’s approval. So, she nodded. 

“Charlotte Mildred.”

Kerry looked from her smiling wife to the baby girl in her arms. 

“Hi, Charlie,” she whispered.

The baby’s big blue eyes opened at the sound of her name. She let out a little squeak and a yawn before she wiggled like she was snuggling herself deeper into Kerry’s arms. 

Three. _Three_ baby girls. One by chance, one by circumstance, and one by plan, but all three of them theirs. Their girls. Their daughters, each born of a different mother, but all three belonging to them. (And one sometimes belonging to Michael.)

Susan had done the math at one point and figured out that the age between Annie and Suzie was almost exactly the same as the difference between Suzie and the new baby. When she’d asked how Annie felt being so much older than her new baby ~~sibling~~ sister, Annie happily replied that it was perfect, because “It’s multiplied by two and two is my lucky number!”

It certainly seemed like it, Kerry thought. Two moms, two dads, two sisters, two crutches… Two may very well be her lucky number after all.

As if the Universe could tell she was thinking of Charlie’s older sisters and twitched the strings to bring them back at that moment, Kerry and Susan heard the sounds of their other daughters’ excited voices coming down the hall. 

“We’ve got a _lot_ of pudding,” Annie announced immediately upon entering the room. 

“And Bugles!” Suzie added.

But as soon as she’d lifted the bag in triumph, she and Annie both spotted the baby in Kerry’s arms and dropped whatever they were holding and rushed to climb onto the bed. 

(Thankfully, Mark was carrying the pudding cups.)

“Girls, you can’t just leave your-” Kerry stopped herself mid-sentence. “You know what? I don’t care.”

“What’s her name?” Annie asked as she (carefully) took a seat on the bed between Susan and Kerry. 

“Charlotte,” Susan replied with a smile. “We’re going to call her Charlie.”

“Isn’t Charlie a boy’s name?” Suzie asked, frowning. 

“Not if the person who has it tells you they’re a girl,” Susan replied simply.

Suzie considered this for a moment and then shrugged. 

“Okay.”

Susan and Kerry chuckled as they watched the girls peer at their new sister. But as Suzie tried to see the baby from a better angle, she accidentally set her hand down on Kerry’s wound, causing Kerry to suck in air.

“What happened?” Suzie asked as she quickly recoiled, her little face alight with concern. “Are you sore again?

“It’s okay. You just touched my boo-boo,” she said as she released air. 

But the reassurance wasn’t enough to keep Suzie from climbing off the bed, almost in tears at the thought that she’d accidentally hurt Momma _twice_ in one night.

“Suzie, honey, it’s okay,” Kerry said as she nodded Mark over to help pass Charlie to Susan. “I know you didn’t mean to.”

“Why don’t we take turns being on the bed with Momma? That way you can be on the side without her boo-boo,” Susan suggested as she instructed Mark to put Charlie in the bassinet. “I can get into bed and hold the baby over there if you want to come closer.”

Suzie still looked very worried, but nodded, nonetheless.

Mark put Charlie down into the bassinet and then rolled it closer to the chair he’d been sitting in earlier. He then paused for the girls to climb down and gather around the bassinet to look at Charlie so he could help Susan into the wheelchair and over to the other bed. 

While Kerry did not like Susan being so far from her without a comfortable way to get to her on her own, she couldn’t deny the way she relaxed as soon as she was alone in the bed again.

Elizabeth re-joined them in the room just as Susan was settled into the bed. She didn’t have a chance to say anything, much less update them on Carmen’s condition (or anything else), before the girls pointed her towards the new baby. 

She smiled as they told her everything they could about their new sister. At one point, Charlie stretched or moved, causing the blanket around her to fall away. 

Immediately, Annie and Suzie both asked their Aunt Lizzie to adjust it back so Charlie didn’t get cold (seeing as the only thing she had on was a diaper). Aunt Lizzie did as they requested, but then paused. 

“What’s wrong?” Annie asked, standing on her toes to see what Aunt Lizzie was looking at. 

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Elizabeth replied quickly. “I was just… You see how her foot is turned in? I was looking at it because it’s a bit unusual and we might want to tell her doctor about it.”

Susan and Kerry both automatically looked up at “...we might want to tell her doctor about it.” Annie, though, did not seem fazed.

“Oh, I think I know what that is,” she said with a sincere nod. 

“You do?” Elizabeth said, raising an eyebrow. 

“I think that means that she’s got a weird hip. Because her foot and her knee are both turned in. That’s what Momma’s foot does when her hip hurts,” Annie informed her. _“My_ foot doesn’t go in, though. It goes the other way.”

Elizabeth looked at her closely for a moment.

“Are you serious?”

Annie blinked. 

“Why _wouldn’t_ I be serious?” she asked, confused.

Elizabeth gave a small nod of acknowledgement before looking up at Charlie’s moms who looked at her and then at each other. 

“What are the chances she _could_ have a weird hip?” Susan asked in a far less concerned voice than Kerry wouldn’t have expected. “Given that I don’t have one.”

“Well, apart from positive family history, I guess she _does_ have the risk factors,” Kerry said slowly. “Female, breech before she turned, first-born-”

“No, _I’m_ the first-born,” Annie interrupted. 

Normally, Kerry would have used the interruption as a teachable moment, but in this case (due mostly to the whine in her voice), she just smiled. 

“Yes, honey. You are,” Kerry said, nodding. “I meant ‘first-born’ in that Charlie is the first baby that _Mommy_ has had. But you’re still _my_ first-born and you’re still the oldest.”

Once Annie was successfully reassured that her status as the oldest sister was not in some way threatened by the new baby, Kerry looked back to Susan.

“I guess you’re not the only one with a dislocated hip tonight,” Susan said with a small shrug. 

Though the implications of the statement caused Kerry’s chest to tighten, the calmness with which it was said abated her fears before they could even begin. After all, what was another weird hip in the scheme of things, really? It wasn’t like they didn’t know what to do.

Susan asked to make a note to ask the pediatrician about it when they next came around in the case that she nor Kerry remembered too. And before Kerry could say something to refute the assertion she’d forget something of that importance, she yawned and remembered exactly how exhausted she felt. 

She wasn’t the only one, apparently, as within only a few minutes, Suzie crept up to the side of Kerry’s bed and quietly asked for her bunny back. Kerry handed it over, but also patted the spot on the bed to her right in offering.

Suzie obliged and crossed around the bed to cuddle with her once more (though this time without the same risk of accidentally hurting her). 

Watching Suzie settle into bed seemed to remind Annie of something, as before Kerry could offer her a cot on the floor between them, Annie waved her Uncle Mark over and whispered something into his ear. He listened intently for a moment and then nodded, before excusing himself from the room.

He returned a few minutes later with a pastel gift bag, which he handed to Annie. Annie took it from him.

“Is that for the baby?” Susan asked as Annie came around in between her mothers’ hospital beds. 

“Yep,” she replied, nodding as she held it out to her. “We got it when we were out with Aunt Lizzie and Uncle Mark a while ago. Uncle Mark kept it in his locker downstairs for us so that it would be here when the baby was born.”

Annie handed the gift bag to Susan, who took it. She pulled a few pieces of crumpled yellow tissue paper out and set them aside before pulling out the gift.

“It’s a panda,” Susan said, smiling as she lifted the black-and-white Beanie Baby out of the bag and holding it up for Kerry to see. “Thank you, girls. I’m sure the baby will love it.”

“She might be too little to love it right now. Because it’s almost as big as her,” Annie thought out loud. “But maybe, for right now, Momma could hold it for her instead.”

“I think that’s a great idea,” Susan said, smiling gently as she handed the panda to Annie to give to Kerry. 

“We chose a panda for Grandma,” Suzie added (sleepily) as Kerry tucked the panda into her arm where Pip Pop had been earlier. 

“For Grandma?” Kerry asked with sudden emotion caught in her throat. 

Kerry watched Suzie nod before looking at Annie, who did the same. 

“Grandma and Grandpa gave me Rex and Grandma gave Suzie Pip Pop, but neither Grandma or Grandpa are here to give the new baby a toy,” Annie explained seriously. “And I asked Grandma what her favorite animal was and she said it was a panda, so Suzie and I got a panda for the new baby. For Grandma.”

Kerry felt another round of tears dampen her eyes as she looked down at the stuffed toy in her arm. Then, she glanced up at Annie, frowning in confusion.

“Grandma told you her favorite animal was a panda?” she asked curiously. “She always told me it was a giraffe.”

Annie smiled a bit sheepishly. 

“She said that she always told you that because _your_ favorite animal was a giraffe and you got really excited once when you thought you had the same favorite animal. She didn’t want to disappoint you, so she told you she had the same favorite.”

Kerry let out a watery scoff. 

“She let me buy her giraffe things into adulthood,” she said with a touch of her normal indignance in her voice. 

“Well, she said that giraffes kinda became her _other_ favorite animal,” Annie said quickly. “Because every time she saw a giraffe thing, she thought of you and that made her happy.”

“That’s very sweet,” Susan said, grinning. She glanced at Kerry. “Your favorite animal is a giraffe?”

“What have you got against giraffes?” Kerry replied defensively before she could stop herself. 

“That wasn’t meant to be a judgement,” Susan said, raising her hands. “I just think it’s cute.”

“Grandma said giraffes have been Momma’s favorite animal since she was like two,” Annie informed her happily. 

Susan’s grin grew at the sight of the deepening blush in Kerry’s cheeks. 

“Thank you, Annie.”

“You’re welcome,” Annie replied brightly.

Kerry chuckled and looked back down at the panda. And as she considered why her mother’s collection of giraffe statuettes and artwork had been so treasured to her even though she’d apparently preferred pandas all along, she thought back to the feeling of the hand on her arm earlier that night.

 _Promise me you’re going to take care of your girls,_ Mildred had said. _All of them._

She’d never once believed that Mildred had made her promise that because she thought Kerry wouldn’t do so otherwise. She’s always thought it was just to hear her say it. To make sure she remembered it in times like this.

But as she laid her head back against the pillow, listening to Suzie’s baby snores from where she lay curled into her side, she realized the second part of the promise had gone unspoken. 

_Promise me you’re going to take care of your girls. Because so long as you take care of them, they will take care of you._

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Longtime no see. (Sort of.)
> 
> As I said on  [ my tumblr ](Http://www.tumblr.com/bwayfan25/) , I was asked if I’d ever considered writing an au where Kerry ended up opposite Sobriki on the night of Valentine’s Day. And though I did more have any additional AUs in the works, it was too good of an idea to not use for something. So, I took one canon divergence and diverged it a bit more. 
> 
> This was an interesting write for me as it was kind of like writing fanfiction of my fanfiction. I used some of the same lines and callbacks techniques to the “canon” version of AU events for this that I would when referencing actual canon. I even used a line from “unexpected circumstances” at one point (and maybe one joke from Skyrim that I couldn’t resist). I hope that adds to it in a positive way. And if you haven’t read the AU yet before you read this, I 1) highly recommend going back and doing that, and 2) am very interested in you sharing in the comments what you think is going on/whether or not this made enough sense at it was without the additional context. 
> 
> I mentioned when I teased this story that I started choking up at the same time she did. It occurred to me as I was choreographing/ writing the fight scene that it would make a lot of sense for Kerry’s dealing with her own mortality to include not only her family but her parents. And, most importantly, her mother. I started choking up at the moment that she thinks she’s failed her one last wish. On top of everything else, she couldn’t do this one thing she’d promised Mildred she’d do. But as she’s accepting that failure as she’s accepting her death, she feels her mother with her and knows that she’s not done yet. 
> 
> (Side note: The conversation about giraffes was directly inspired by a  [ photo set on tumblr about Kerry’s giraffe scrub cap ](https://sapphicsandscience.tumblr.com/post/632569175072751616/today-i-give-you-kerry-her-giraffe-scrub-cap) .)
> 
> I hope you all have enjoyed this and that it feels true both to the alternate canon and to the AU. I will not make any promises with NaNoWriMo coming up, but I may go a bit further with this to explore Kerry’s recovery. Again, no promises, but I look forward to hearing your thoughts nonetheless! 
> 
> Oh! And one thing that didn’t make it in but I wanted to share with you in the case I don’t go further: Kerry lets the girls pick out colors for the cast and ends up with a lime green and sky blue striped wrist cast. 


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